


Luck Favors the Prepared

by sergeant_angel



Series: Evil Eyes and Daring Dodos [4]
Category: Daredevil (TV), Hawkeye (Comics)
Genre: F/M, Gen, have i told you how much i love the meta behind costuming superheroes, i have finally come up with a story for the purple suit she wears in the comics, lame music jokes, music name dropping, the evolution of superhero costumes, well i do, yes i wrote a fic about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 21:36:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6771163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sergeant_angel/pseuds/sergeant_angel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Melvin Potter makes superhero clothes. Kate Bishop loves being a superhero, AND clothes. Obviously, this is going to be a good partnership.<br/>(Matt stops hoarding friends like a dragon and everyone appreciates it)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Luck Favors the Prepared

Kate hadn’t planned on ever meeting Melvin Potter. He’s Matt’s friend, not to mention she can still sneak SHIELD gear out from time to time. She doesn’t need a suit.

Except apparently, one day Melvin asks about Daredevil’s friend, and Matt asks her to tag along and bring her suit.

“That gear’s all right,” Melvin says, taking a hammer to the reinforced panels along the chest. “But I hear you get beat up a lot as a civilian. You know that’s how I started, right? Civilian gear. Could probably make you a jacket or something, shirt or dress even, protect you at least a little more.”

Kate doesn’t want to say Melvin Potter is her favorite person in Hell’s Kitchen, but she also feels the need to point out that Matt is standing right next to her, and she might be sort-of dating him, and saying Melvin is would be rude.

* * *

Melvin has very specific music tastes depending on his task. Classical in general (sometimes they discuss cellists and she'd given him a few playlists with her favorite pieces once she'd figured it out)

Barry Manilow for important days, usually an anniversary, or the opening night of a show he designed the costumes for (a fact that delights Kate to _no end_ , Melvin Potter, actual legit costume designer. She's getting into the habit of dragging Tasha or Billy to these shows)

Queen when he’s on a self-imposed deadline (usually helmet-related, sometimes day-job related).

She’d loaned him her uniform so he could try to reverse-engineer the fabric and every time she’d gone in he’d just had Ravel’s _Bolero_ on repeat (don't get her wrong, she loves _Bolero_ , but. Every day she'd brought it in. For. Two. Weeks.)

* * *

The third time he’d mentioned keeping Betsy safe, Kate decided to be proactive about things.

“I could help,” she offers, interrupting Matt’s promises that nothing’s going to happen to her (The Marshall Tucker Band is playing in the background, it’s not helping sell the seriousness). “Keeping her out of harm, that’s important. But I can teach her some stuff to defend herself. If you think she’d want to.”

Melvin Potter, who some days is probably the only reason Daredevil isn’t a corpse in the river, looks at her like she’s pushed the clouds away from the sun.

“I’ll ask her.”

* * *

Her helmet flummoxes him. There’s no other word for it.

“There’s no reason this should protect you from _anything_ at _all_ ,” he insists.

Someone had taken a baseball bat to her head, and other than being pissed and having a little whiplash, she’s fine.

“You may as well go out there with a shower cap on for all the structural integrity this thing has. How does this even work?” He twists it in his hands, as if to prove the point about how useless it is.

“I have a friend,” Kate shrugs as Matt does a poor job of covering his smile. “He’s got a gift.”

“He could make a fortune.”

“His gift is sometimes erratic. Honestly, _he’s_ surprised by how well it’s held up. I’m telling you, Melvin, there’s nothing special about it except the person who gave it to me.”

“Okay.” He gives it back to her reluctantly. “If you’re sure.”

* * *

Betsy does, eventually, take Kate up on the self-defense lessons. She’s smaller even than Kate, but, as Kate informs her within five minutes of meeting her, size is no indicator of strength, and strength is no indicator of intelligence.

“Big guys,” Kate informs her, “are used to just being able to overpower people, a lot of the time. Using their weight or their size against them is something they usually aren’t prepared for. If a person is tall, use your lower center of gravity to your advantage. Long arms, get inside their reach.”

“Small and mighty?” Betsy smiles at her.

“That’s how we roll.”

* * *

“I don’t get it.” Kate snaps the new outfit through the air—or attempts to, the fabric isn’t stiff enough to make noise. “Usually you give me civilian clothes in disguise. This is—"

“Daredevil’s got a look,” he cuts her off. He does that a lot; she’s stopped taking it personally, at least when he’s talking shop. “You should have a look, too.”

“My look is _blend into the shadows_ ,” she protests.

“Well, this will. Just—you gotta have a look, okay? Trust me. You like purple. Your old one is purple.”

“What’s with all the holes?” she wrinkles her nose at the gaps in the fabric. "Why is half of this outfit missing?"

“Touch ‘em.”

“What?”

“ _Touch ‘em_ ,” he grabs her fingers and closes them around one of the empty spaces—only instead of nothing, her fingers meet some sort of resistance. “It’s a prototype offa one of the things you let me work on. Ballistic mesh. Light, breathable. Not as indestructible as the rest of it, but it’ll protect you.”

“Mesh?”

“Every time you two’re in here you complain about how hot you’ve been since summer. Figured we’d test on you since you get in less trouble than the Devil does.”

“Good thinking.” Kate examines the open spaces more carefully. Sections of the shoulders seem to be missing completely, but the lower arms are sturdy, like he’s built in arm guards. Sections along the hips, a little along the sides, are filled in with a near-transparent material.

“The new stuff is gonna give you more mobility. It’s why I put it in the shoulders, and the sides, give you good range of motion, let you twist easier for shooting moving targets. Not as tough as the other stuff, not yet,” he warns. “Knives, you’ll do fine, low caliber weapons, you’ll do okay. If you fight ninjas again—put the other one on.”

“Noted and filed.”

“This is just the prototype, remember. If you try it and it works we can try making it darker. This is just the first batch and I figured I’d get it to you right away.”

Tom Jones plays in the background as she slips into the new outfit. It’s lightweight and softer than she’d realized, and all the open mesh feels like she’s not wearing anything.

“It’s too comfortable,” she informs Melvin. “I don’t doubt your abilities but there’s no way something this comfortable can be—"

She rounds the corner and Melvin throws a knife that skids uselessly off of her shoulder. “Huh. Okay. Complaint retracted.”

“Wanna take it on a test run?”

“Is that a trick question?”

* * *

Kate is bouncing along the rooftops of Hell’s Kitchen, reveling in how _not_ hot and sweaty she feels in her new, fully-ventilated outfit, singing to herself. Melvin had given her new boots, too, and she’s still deciding if she likes having her batons at her calves instead on at her thigh.

She jumps, manages a roll that _doesn’t_ set the batons clanging against the roof, singing, " _It’s not unusual to be loved by anyone—"_

Before coming across a man—a Marine, going by the haircut—drinking coffee, and Daredevil chained up across from him.

“Well,” she’s got an arrow aimed at the man before he’s on his feet. “This is unusual.”


End file.
